Analyzing the 2013 Twins using MLB 13: The Show

I buy MLB the Show every single year. I always think that I won't and then I do. I buy it, play it a lot, then completely forget about it. In fact, here is an easy to use monthly breakdown of my MLB the Show usage:

March - Buy the game, play it often.

April - Continue to play the game, less often, tell myself "I'll just play this one for the next two years and [PRBREAK][/PRBREAK]buy the newer version every other year."

May-February - Completely forget about MLB the Show, place disk under a couch, in a cereal bowl or on a shelf.

Late February - See a commercial or read a review for the next MLB the Show, tell myself "Eh, I don't really need to buy this."

Early March - See some extremely minor change in the new game that makes me want to buy it.

Using this information, you can logically conclude that I am in the "play it often" stage of my MLB the Show development cycle. In fact, I did buy the game. I stopped on my way home from work Wednesday and I bought it. I played it for a little bit that night, then really got into it on Friday, when I didn't have to work.

It's fun. It always is. The minor change that convinced me to buy the game this year is about as minor as it gets. They finally decided to give players numerical ratings instead of vague bar graph ratings! Yeah! This is nice because it is now much easier to see which players are better than others. This is important to me for some reason. I'm 30.

Anyway, I thought it would be fun to see what Sony thinks of the Twins. In looking at the player ratings, there are some questionable ratings, along with some downright comical ratings. All of the ratings are out of 99.

Joe Mauer leads the way with an overall 93. He also has a clutch rating of 99, so take that, haterz1! Mauer also leads the way with a 90 contact rating, an 82 arm strength rating, a 90 fielding rating, and a 99 handsome rating. In short:

Sony ♥ Joe Mauer

The Twins best pitcher, according to Sony, is Glen Perkins, with an overall rating of 90. He has the best control on the team, at 90, and the highest K/9 rating with an 81. He also has a fielding rating of 6. Interestingly, whenever a ball is hit to Perkins in the game, he falls down and splits his pants. Nobody's perfect.

This opens itself to a debate. Is Anthony Swarzak good or bad at horseplay? He did crack ribs as a result of horseplay, but what is the true goal of horseplay? Perhaps we can come back to this, at another time.

Jamey Carroll has "A" potential, and stands to get better as he gets older

Now, not all Twins players are in the game. If a player wasn't in the MLB last season, they do not appear. So, Aaron Hicks, Joe Benson, Rich Harden, Kyle Gibson, and so forth, are all MIA. But, you can make players, which is a tedious chore. I made Aaron Hicks, based on his current Spring Training performance. Here is the result:

Not sure I captured his eyes perfectly, but everything else seems about right.

If Sony has anything to say about it, here is the Opening Day lineup:

[TABLE="width: 134"]

Mastroianni

CF

Carroll

2B

Mauer

C

Willingham

LF

Morneau

1B

Doumit

DH

Parmelee

RF

Plouffe

3B

Florimon

SS

[/TABLE]Apparently, Ron Gardenhire works for Sony. Here is the rotation:

WorleyDiamondCorreiaHendriksPelfrey

Looks to be fairly accurate actually. I might flip a few around, but those five seem pretty likely. Of course, if you take the five best starters by rating, it would look like this:

Worley - 84Pelfrey - 78Diamond - 77De Vries - 76Correia - 74

Prior to a roster update, De Vries was an embarrassing 81 overall, and was the Twins' best starter. They addressed that issue within the first 24 hours of the game launch. His rating is still much too high. Apparently Sony loves players from Minnesota as much as we all do.

You like former Twins? Here are some of the more notable ratings I found when looking around:

I want that hat. The worst former Twin I could find is Eric Komatsu, at an emasculating 55 overall. Most of the computer generated minor leaguers are better than Eric Komatsu. Jeff Gray is nowhere to be found, but I am sure we can all agree that he would be a -84.

But, my favorite part of this whole exercise was finding Nick Blackburn, pitching as the Ace of the New Britain Rock Cats. In fact, Sony didn't even put his picture in the game, opting to computer generate him.

Not terrible, but Blackburn's real face isn't that fat. His K/9 is worst on the team, but you already knew that.

~~~

If you prefer real baseball news to tomfoolery, I analyzed the Kyle Lohse signing that hasn't happened yet. You can read it here: Kyle Lohse signs with [MLB Team].